


Nothing Remarkable

by Vae



Category: Slings & Arrows
Genre: F/M, Gratuitous abuse of Shakespeare, even more gratuitous abuse of Brecht
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-14
Updated: 2012-08-14
Packaged: 2017-11-12 04:15:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486572
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vae/pseuds/Vae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's a bitch. She's always been a bitch.</p>
<p>The thing is, the thing she never quite remembered as clearly as she wanted, blunted and blurred by infuriating nostalgia, the important thing is: </p>
<p>So has he.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing Remarkable

"And don't even _think_ about coming back!"

The door slams with an almost-satisfying thud, harder even than she'd intended, open window across the room making the passage easier but robbing her of the solidity of sound she wants. Enough to make her scowl at the door even as the ugly vase her sister gave her as a housewarming gift finishes the _roinroinkerklunk_ of a wobble that won't tip it enough to fall. A wobble that won't shatter it, that lets it settle back upright with a whisper of cheap porcelain on even cheaper unfinished pine.

Ellen tips her head back, eyes closed, and places the palm of her hand over her third eye as she draws in a deep, cleansing breath. Shoulders rising, breathe in cool (no matter how much she wants to spit and snarl), hand sliding back into her hair as her shoulders drop with the exhale. 

Breathe out anger. Stay still. Hold the moment, remember it, commit it to heart, to mind, to memory, lock it. She can _use_ this.

Stillness. Silence. The drop of her hand as she opens her eyes, emotion and the physicality of it safely stored, enough to let it go. To pace across the room and tug the satin of her hastily-snatched robe back into place before opening the door. 

He's there. Of course Geoffrey's there. He's sitting on the floor, one shoulder leaning heavily enough against her door that he half-falls into her room again when she takes that support from him. He sprawls, half on the hallway floor, half on the floor of her room, looking up at her with the lost-puppy look she's still trying to find annoying instead of charming. Looking up through those ridiculously long lashes, hair tousled to fall across his forehead and half over one dark eye. 

"One day," he says, with every appearance of absolute sincerity, lifting a hand to emphasise his point, one finger raised in her direction, "one day, you are going to be a truly magnificent Gertrude."

"Out," she orders, brisk, without regret, no room for argument. He probably thinks he's paying her a compliment. Probably. If she gives him the benefit of the doubt. The benefit of assuming that it's not an insult. 

She's going to be a truly magnificent Ophelia, if her Hamlet ever sobers up. 

"Ellen..." He turns soulful eyes up towards her again. "My dove. Light of my life, my eternal soul..."

"Holder of your keys?" she interrupts waspishly, and drops his jacket over his face. "Out. Go _home_."

>>>

He makes her breakfast. 

He can't ruin orange juice, but dear God, the eggs.

>>>

She's a bitch. She's always been a bitch.

The thing is, the thing she never quite remembered as clearly as she wanted, blunted and blurred by infuriating nostalgia, the _important_ thing is: 

So has he.

>>>

It takes less than an hour of Geoffrey being back in Ellen's bed to clear the comfort of nostalgia away. It's not as if either of them ever held any particular illusions about each other, or themselves. She knows the terror of sharply painful self-knowledge that had tipped Geoffrey beyond what most people would call sanity - or at least the polite appearance of it that they all perform in public. He knows the paranoia of aging that haunts her every time another ingenue joins the company, even if they never stay beyond a single season when Ellen... Ellen remains.

"I'll go to Berlin," she threatens, one hand braced between pillows as she leans over him for the cigarettes she'll swear to anyone that she gave up years ago. "I'll go to Darren in Berlin. I'll play his Mother Courage."

Geoffrey groans, as theatrical as anything he's ever produced on stage, and reaches out - not for her, but for the lighter she wants, plastic clattering as it sweeps from the nightstand to the floor. "You wouldn't. You _couldn't_. You'd destroy him in a week. And you can't play Brecht."

Her fingers curl, digging into the sheet as she tries to decide whether to indulge the spiralling hot promise of anger, the stab of fear that he's right, that she couldn't. "You don't know that. You've never seen me play Brecht. You wouldn't want to see me play Brecht, you can't _stand_ Brecht."

"Because he's a derivative hack, a cynical jaded politician of a playright, there's no _truth_ to his characters, there's no soul in his plays." It's satisfying, how easy it is to get Geoffrey to rise to the reliable bait, his eyes fired, his voice strengthening with the passion that's always drawn her. Passion for theatre, for her, for truth, whatever that actually means any more. "Brecht destroys the human spirit, Ellen, he denies it, he only ever holds out hope to deny it and to crush it, to deepen the darkness, and you don't even speak German, how would you survive Berlin?"

Ellen raises her chin, as haughty as she can manage when she's lunging across him to stretch down for her lighter. "They respect actresses in Berlin. They respect _artists_. And why, why wouldn't I go, why would I stay here, what do I have to stay here for, what _reason_? You'll only end up staging Richard III to complete your cycle of tragedies and I'm not waiting to play someone's mother again, someone dead's mother, I'm not old enough to play someone's mother, why would I - "

"Cleopatra," he interrupts her. Voice soft and low, that smile lighting his face, he catches her outstretched hand, bringing it back to clasp over his heart. Bastard. "Cleopatra, my Cleopatra, stay with me and be my Cleopatra, my queen. My nightingale."

"Your fool." She's heard it before, moving to free her hand as his hold tightens. "You'll never convince the board."

"But we will." Geoffrey bends his head, eyes never leaving her face as he kisses her knuckles, drawing the cigarette from between her fingers. "You and I. We'll invite Thomas to be your Antony."

Ellen pauses, caught. She wants, God, she wants so badly to believe him, and she'll never find another company to cast her as Cleopatra, but...No. His dream's taken him again, his fantasy, and loosened his hold enough for her to break free, pull back onto her knees to glare at him. "Don't be ridiculous, we can't afford Thomas Handelman."

"Thomas Handelman owes me a favour." Hint of smugness to his grin, he shifts to his knees to mirror her, slides back until he falls from the side of the bed. Graceful, as if he's intended it, and she follows, dropping forward to all fours to see him kneeling there, her lighter held up like a peace offering. "Just picture it. You in gold, Thomas Handelman your Antony... downstage."

That's a low blow. Low, but effective, image arresting enough to slow her hand as she reaches for her lighter. Geoffrey shakes his head, pulls it back, flicks flame to life and holds it dancing in front of her for a few seconds before letting it die again. Long enough to leave afterimages, not long enough to burn his thumb. "I am dying, Egypt, dying; only I here importune death awhile, until Of many thousand kisses the poor last I lay upon thy lips."

Low. Low, and unwantedly effective, desire stirring to life at the expression on his face, the mischief, the promise, the enchantment. The fire. Ellen shakes her head, reaches for her cigarette, fails to find it and fails to frown when Geoffrey holds it up in offer to her. "It's a dream."

"Then dream it _with_ me." He flicks the lighter again, lets the flame dance. Brief, unsubstantial, promise of so much power never fulfilled. "Please your thoughts In feeding them with those my former fortunes."

"Your former fortunes almost destroyed you," she says crossly, plucks her cigarette back and rests it between her lips, stretching forwards towards the flame to let him light it for her. "They almost destroyed _all_ of us, God knows - "

"The greatest prince o' the world," he murmurs, eyes steady, always on her face when she looks at him. When she glances back after checking the flame, when she opens her eyes after the drag through sweet nicotine to catch light, when she's caught as much by the fire there as the one snapping out in his fingers. 

One prince to another. Ophelia to Gertrude. Actor to director. Youth to... later youth. 

Geoffrey to Geoffrey, and Ellen to Ellen. And _Cleopatra_.

She draws thoughtfully on her cigarette, and exhales smoke deliberately in his face. He blinks, doesn't flinch, doesn't draw back. If anything, his smile widens. 

She quirks an eyebrow. Just one, pensive, then shifts position. Not as smoothly as in her Ophelia days but smoothly enough, legs drawn around until she can stretch her right foot out to his shoulder, pushing.

He pushes back, enough to let her know he can, before letting her guide him back, shoulders dropping onto her floor as her foot rests on his chest. Still watching. 

"There is nothing left remarkable," she quotes softly, "beneath the visiting moon."

Geoffrey laughs, sudden, warm, sure of her. Sure of himself, as his eyes track for one moment to the window and the sun streaming through it. "We'll show them remarkable."

"Show _me_ ," Ellen demands.

He does.

**Author's Note:**

> this hasn't been beta'd - if you're willing to run a beta eye over this, please, please contact me - I don't know anyone else who knows this fandom.


End file.
